City replaces April Parker Foundation with LA nonprofit to run Long Beach Youth Shelter

Eight months ago, April Parker joined community partners and city officials to celebrate the grand opening of the Youth Shelter and Navigation Center, a first-of-its-kind facility in Long Beach designed to support transitional-age youth experiencing homelessness.

The shelter, which has 12 beds, was established to help young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 find stability and access essential resources. Initially, the April Parker Foundation had been selected to operate the center and was expected to begin welcoming youth the following month in September.

But during Tuesday’s City Council meeting, officials instead voted to contract with Jovenes Inc., a Los Angeles-based nonprofit, to oversee operations and support services at the facility.

A spokesperson for the Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services said the April Parker Foundation was notified in October 2025 that the city would not be moving forward with the contract.

“This decision was made after the city identified repeated concerns regarding APF’s performance under a prior contract with the city,” the spokesperson said.

According to the department, those concerns date back to November 2023, when the city awarded APF a contract to provide rapid rehousing, rental assistance and supportive services for residents experiencing homelessness. Officials said the nonprofit’s practices “did not consistently align with contract requirements,” citing issues such as delayed invoices and missing documentation.

City staff said they worked with the foundation throughout its contract to address performance issues, providing ongoing communication, training and technical assistance on invoicing, documentation and data reporting.

"This included ongoing communication, training and technical assistance related to invoicing, documentation and data reporting," the city  spokesperson said, noting that support continued even as some delays persisted.

Despite those efforts, some concerns remained unresolved over the course of the contract period, according to the city. After reviewing the foundation's overall performance, the city ultimately determined it would no longer partner with the foundation.

Parker disputes the city’s claims. She said her foundation never received any notice of performance issues or requests for corrective action and only learned of the city’s change in direction after asking for access to the facility last October.

“At no time did our foundation receive any notifications of performance issues, nor were any meetings held to resolve them,” Parker said in an interview. “At the end of 2025, we were owed a little under a million dollars in unpaid invoices.”

Parker said her foundation hired staff for the youth shelter as directed by the city. Additionally, she claims there are still several outstanding invoices from other projects the foundation previously ran for the city, all of which have now been dissolved.

The foundation has retained attorney Robin Perry and is preparing to file a lawsuit next week against the city over the unpaid invoices, according to Parker, who added that she hopes to resolve the issue outside the courtroom.

Despite hosting a grand opening eight months ago, to date, the shelter has not provided services to anyone. A spokesperson for the health department said the delay is due to plumbing repairs.

The building previously served as one of the city’s winter shelters for unhoused residents in 2020 and 2021. It’s unclear why the plumbing issues were not taken care of prior to the “grand opening” event last year.

A second grand opening event is expected in early May, according to city officials.

The city put the contract out for bid in December and received three proposals. Parker said she did not submit a bid because she was told by the city they were moving in a different direction.

Jovenes Inc. brings experience working with local youth through its college success initiatives and existing partnerships with Cal State Long Beach and Long Beach City College, according to a city staff report. The organization’s one-year contract, valued at just over $565,000, began this month.